Wahnes's Parotia

Taxobox
name = Wahnes's Parotia
status = VU
status_system = iucn3.1
trend = down
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Aves
ordo = Passeriformes
familia = Paradisaeidae
genus = "Parotia"
species = "P. wahnesi"
binomial = "Parotia wahnesi"
binomial_authority = Rothschild, 1906

Wahnes's Parotia ("Parotia wahnesi") is a medium-sized passerine of the birds of paradise family (Paradisaeidae). The male has an iridescent yellow-green breast shield, elongated black plumes, three erectile spatule head wires behind each eye, coppery-bronzed nasal tuft feathers and long, wedge-shaped tail feathers. The female is a rich brown bird with blackish head. It is approximately 43cm long. This species is distributed and endemic to the mountain forests of Huon Peninsula and Adelbert Mountains, northeast Papua New Guinea. The diet consists mainly of fruits and arthropods. The male is polygamous and performs a spectacular courtship dance in the forest ground.

Little is known about its life and habits. The clutch probably contains 1, maybe 2 eggs. These are about 40 x 26 mm and have a pale cream base color. They have a varying pattern of streaks and dots, dense at the large end and very sparse on the other, and consisting of a lower gray and an upper tan layer with some overlap.(Mackay 1990) The name honors the German collector Carl Wahnes, who discovered the species in 1906Verify source|date=July 2007.

Wahnes's Parotia is evaluated as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. It is listed on Appendix II of CITES; its threat classification is C2a(1). This indicates that less than 10,000 adult birds exist, fragmented into subpopulations of less than 1000, and that they are probably declining.

References

*|year=2004|id=16269|title=Parotia wahnesi|downloaded=11 May 2006 Database entry includes justification for why this species is vulnerable
* (1990): The Egg of Wahnes' Parotia "Parotia wahnesi" (Paradisaeidae). "Emu" 90(4): 269. [http://www.publish.csiro.au/?act=view_file&file_id=MU9900269.pdf PDF fulltext]

External links

* [http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/species/index.html?action=SpcHTMDetails.asp&sid=5825&m=0 BirdLife Species Factsheet]